AI Edits from Understand the Truth About Your Ability to Alter Your Loved Ones Addiction (1)
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~We stay confused. ~[00:00:00] The two factors that we really need to understand are one, our external facts and two, our internal management needs. What I mean by that is external facts are things that give us power or influence or ... They can include things like, does my loved one live with me? Does my loved one live in a different state?
Do I provide or manage money for my loved one? Does my loved one drive a car in my name? Do I have my own money if I'm a partner or a spouse? Do I have the money to spend on treatment? Period. Regardless of where we are, do we have this money that we can allocate for this? Have I researched levels of care and recommendations of treatment and aftercare?
Do I understand what they cost? Do I have backup or adversaries or hurdles within my immediate family? Is my partner with me on the same page? Are my parents going to undermine me? Do I have other children whose needs may be super, super prevented if I follow mine? Are there [00:01:00] restrictions? While these seem pretty basic, these are often, all too far often.
Clients have not thought about these and they're going full blown ahead with some strategy they've heard about or read about, and then they're confused or shocked when they realize that they need more knowledge and decision making. They have to understand really what do I have to work with here?
What are my limitations and restrictions and obstacles to my goal? These can often be worked around or changed, which is the good news. The second and almost always overlooked or neglected about as to why we're stuck or confused about why our loved one isn't responding to these strategies or communication changes we may be implementing and all the things we're trying to do that we're told we should do.
This component is an internal one. And this is a massive obstacles and not only our desires, but one that has to be frankly, honestly, difficultly, analyzed, admitted, and shared. [00:02:00] So many times you guys, clients come to us and they haven't been given this aspect of it at all any even review or thought.
And we have to go back in and reevaluate a lot of things for them. This internal management needs system can include things like, is my communication style true to me or a problem for me? Is my communication style helping anything? Do I truly understand the neurobiology of the disease and what happens with addiction in my loved one's brain and thought processes?
Do I understand that I am working from a codependent perspective? And why? That's big. Do I understand what a boundary is or am I confusing them with rules? ~And this is where it gets really tricky, guys. And this is where people really don't do the self-exploration that they need to do. ~Honestly, can I hold a boundary?
~And I am not surprised anymore, but the answer to that is pervasively, and almost 50% of the time I'm talking to a client, no, I can't. ~And instead of beating ourselves up and feeling bad about it now we just need to change our goal. So that's a biggie. Can I tolerate not rescuing or fixing the situation for my loved one?
Can I [00:03:00] tolerate my own discomfort at letting them be uncomfortable? The answer to that is very often, no, I simply cannot and therefore I won't. So if I can't tolerate it, then I'm not gonna hold a boundary. And so these things all start to stack up as to why we're confused and stuck and frustrated and exhausted and all these things that we are when we're dealing with addiction.
Can I tolerate negative change for an unknown or prolonged period of time? Or will this send me, frankly, over the edge and I'll revert to my old patterns? I think people feel bad when they say no, I can't, to these things. And so they act like they can, or they lie to themselves or to their counselor or to their partner and say, "Yes, I can.
But the answer truly is, no, I can't. And I don't ... ~Sometimes this is a cultural issue, sometimes this is an age issue, sometimes this is the way we were reared, sometimes it's our own self-talk, sometimes it's our reality. It doesn't matter. ~It's really important to look at this because otherwise, we are stymied and we don't understand and we're just running out like a hamster on a wheel.
Another question to ask ourselves is, [00:04:00] can I deliver hard or uncomfortable news? Can I say no? Can I put my emotional needs out of my loved one? This is a huge one. Parents are told from the time the baby is born, the baby's emotional needs are more important than yours. That's not true. And in addiction, it can't be true.
We, or we're just stuck. ~Can I tolerate or pay their ... ~Can I tolerate not paying their rent or buying their food when they run out of money? And this is probably 10 to 15 times a week. I have this conversation that I just can't stand it ~if they d- ~if their rent's not paid. Okay. So you're not gonna hold the boundary that they, you're not gonna give them a place to live.
They're like, "No, I'm really not, to be honest." I'm like, "Okay, then let's stop acting as if you are and moving them through the funnel of unmanageability with this in place because it's not gonna be in place. Can I fire my loved one from the family business?" So many of our clients have family businesses that are very profitable, their kids work [00:05:00] there, and I use the term work loosely because lots of times with addiction, they're not going to work, they're not doing a good job, they're inconsistent, but the family can't stand to fire them.
What would it look like to the employees? What would it look like to the family members? How does that even play, right? How does, how do we say, "I let my son go. " If we basically ... ~And these are just examples. There's lots more. ~But if we don't have enough external understanding, then we can learn more about that.
We can figure out what we need to change in that system or tweak before we keep down the road you're on. If you have some or most of the external in place, then you can ask yourself, "Do I have the internal?" And if so, then proceed with your strategy, but all too often, all too frequently, more common than not in our practice when all we see is addiction is that many of our clients do not have this.
They have not done the internal assessment and we discovered that this is really a pivotal starting point in helping people build the plan that they actually need or [00:06:00] can develop and follow. If you can understand and accept your anxiety and fear, which is your codependency, ~and these, the limitations that are, and the reality that this causes us, ~then you do far better in the long run.
And this is where Hope for Family comes in strongly. We can help you have these difficult conversations with yourself ~and save hours of anguish or time or fruitless just pursuits ~because this is just, this is where we often have to start. It may be that you have to accept that you have to live with your current situation for longer than you'd like or maybe even forever, but if your heart can't tolerate it, then that may be your reality.
If this is the case, then we can help you do that with some degree of increased level of happiness and peace. ~The Kim in mind, ~the Beyond Boundaries course has developed intentionally, purposefully, to help you gently, kindly, lead you toward this ability that almost always feels impossible to achieve when our loved one's addiction continues to be in our front face or in our house or in our life, period.
And so we always think, lots of times people think "I'm screwed, this will never end. I have a terrible life ahead of me. " But no, [00:07:00] we can help you figure out that if your heart will not allow you to do what books and people and everybody out there in the world tells you to do, then that's okay. You need to know and understand your real and true goal.
~It might be to get your loved one better, to make them sober. And my personal inner peace be damned until I make this goal. That could be it, okay? ~It might however be that your goal or your need is to have peace in the home and in your heart, and that also is fine. But you have to understand that this goal does not coexist with the goal of I want my loved one to get sober.
~These two can't clap, okay? ~So you have to figure out, if this is the goal, do my external things align that I can get that done, but if my goal is to have peace in my heart, then I need to ignore all of that over there and focus on what do I need to accept? What little things could I change? Are there any little things I can do or are there not?
And then work around that. Because otherwise, what we get into is what I call magical thinking, and it includes ... ~I didn't coin that phrase, I realize, ~but it includes things like, [00:08:00] can't an interventionalist fix this. Can't I just reason with my loved one? Can't we just take doors off and take away the internet so they realize they need to stop?
Can't Amber convince them. Can't you just give me the magic words? I have a client in India who offers me large amounts of cash every time I talk to him if I'll just give him the five magic sentences to get his loved one to stop using drugs. And as much as I love a cash, I don't have the words because it's not, that's just not what it works like.
~It has to, it's, you know this. ~It's unmanageability has to be created. But, and this is what today's video about, if we can't tolerate that unmanageability, instead of feeling bad about ourselves or beating ourselves up or denying it and acting as if we are in the other club, let's just own it. Let's just look at it, let's be honest, let's figure out what is it we can do to make [00:09:00] my life better while this horrific event is happening on the other side of my life.
If wanting to feel better is your goal, that's okay. Please look at this. This is like such a big topic you guys that's just not talked about. It's like the secret behind the secret. Don't do what you think you need to do. Do what you can tolerate. This is a matter of living with our hearts, and that generally has to trump what our brain understands we could or should do.
~It's like the gas clutch on a hill. If you don't have this understanding, if you don't do this self-work, if you don't really look at yourself internally, then you are gonna be a stalled out car, constantly on a hill, gas clutch. And that's just gonna be exhausting to everyone involved.~
And so that may be, maybe not something you wanna think about yourself as being a stalled out car on a hill, but that's what we are until we can really be honest and think about what it is. I said this earlier, these conversations are not usually had. They're not had by counselors. They're certainly not had by interventionalists, treatment centers, or many professionals.
We are instead told, "This [00:10:00] is the only way. You have to do this. If you don't, you're gonna kill your child. If you don't you're gonna be messed up forever. This is never gonna work." And that's just simply not always true. ~And even if it might be somewhat true, we can't live with it. ~And that, at the end of the day, we have to be able to put our pillow on our own heads at night, and we have to be the ones that can sleep with the decisions we made, whether they're wrong or right, if they're right for us, then they're the right decisions.
These are conversations we have in our membership, in the courses we offer, in the individual sessions we have with our family members, because we just have just realized that ~poundings, ~pounding clients into submission, whether it's the addiction, like we also do people with struggling with addiction like this or our families.
I'm like, let's just take a look. Like, where's your heart? Where's your heart? Where are you guys ~aligned? Where are you not alarmed, ~aligned? Let's start there before we start talking about levels of care. Let's start there before we start [00:11:00] telling you what you need to be doing." There's always, especially in parents, there's always a softer heart.
~There's always the parent that's just can't do that, " versus the parent that might be like, "Oh yeah, hell yeah, let's make this happen." ~Always we work to the softer heart, always. That's my main goal in the first one or two sessions with couples is woo-hoo-hoo. Let's figure out where's the softer heart.
And then we work toward that because otherwise, we're going in conflict with what we can live with. Blame is gonna happen if we work to the heart or heart, right? And within mom and dad or brother and sister or whoever's, we're working with. If we work to the heart or heart, if something goes poorly or has a negative outcome, that softer heart person is gonna be livid and blaming forever.
~And then the little harder heart person who's really just trying to do what they were told to do is gonna feel bad. ~And that's just not a situation we ever wanna get into. So if you're confused by your thoughts or feelings or the results you're getting, I would take a look at the internal factors that could be causing this, could be causing you distress, sheer exhaustion, and just stuckness.
And living with addiction is bad enough, [00:12:00] but we don't need to feel bad about ourselves or waste our time or money or emotional resources or feel bad about ourselves. We need to be honest, understand and work with our reality. And that's what we do, and we're happy to help. So I think this video this is a serious video for you guys to I need to look in the mirror, and I don't have to feel bad if I look in the mirror and I'm like, "Yeah, I can't do that.
I can't hold that boundary. I can't hold any boundary." There are lots of reasons that people can't hold boundaries, and it could be a child has died, it could be a brother has died, it could be this is not how I was brought up that parents respond. This is not what I, when I vet, made my wedding vows that I'm going against my wedding vows.
There's a billion reasons, and all of them are fair, and all of them are right to these people. So if you fall into this category, own it, be proud, be honest, get some help with how do you move [00:13:00] despite that? How do you live with that? How do you function in the world with addiction with that in the room? ~So that's all I have to say about that topic, so that was very helpful, and ~we'll see if we have any questions on that.
~That was a little longer than my average, ... All right, let's see here. My wife went to the ER ... Why is that so dull, Bria? I can barely read it. ~My wife went to the ER on four / 14 for alcohol withdrawal. She spent the day there, and two days in ICU, before being moved to a regular hospital room, she's already started drinking again.
I can't get my wife to seek help or go to rehab for alcoholism. So this might be ... First of all, I'm sorry the disease is wicked, as but this might be where you have to look at this external thing of, do I really have any power? And then my internal thing is, can I exert this power if I have it?
Can I tolerate putting down some boundaries and then meaning them and sticking to them and holding them? Again, I say this all the time, a boundary without being held is not a boundary. So this, you're in that tough spot of, what [00:14:00] do I do and what can I do with external admission as well as internal admission?
But the scenario is sadly not uncommon whatsoever. Addiction is cruel and you can have this horrific thing happen and the disease is gonna rel- rationalize and validate that it wasn't that bad. So you only spent two days in the ICU. We'll just have one glass of champagne to celebrate that and that'll be that.
We won't drink again. And here we go.
All right. I took some trial and error before I came to truly understand the difference between a boundary and a rule. Once I learned that aligning my values with my actions were, was imperative, that helped me see the difference between boundaries between. Boundaries are vital for life of peace and serenity.
Amen. Oh, wait a minute. I just hit a wrong button. Being okay with discomfort is possible as many codependency dwells in the comfort of unhealthy behavioral patterns for our own first than others. You're [00:15:00] right. You're right. Boundaries are for per- for internal peace and boundaries.
They're not, they are really not to change a situation. They could change a situation, but that's not the goal and a boundary. The boundaries is, I don't want to live in this anymore. I don't want to experience ~this anymore. I want to be part of ~this anymore. I don't want to tolerate this anymore for my own needs.
And again, you guys boundaries are overused, misunderstood. There are lots of people who just can't have a boundary because they've been taught that other people are more important. They've been taught that if I don't put myself second, then I'm a selfish, bad person. If I don't take care of other people's needs, then that's wrong.
And there are other people that are taught you can take care of yourself as long as you're kind and generous and nice, that's okay. N- neither one is wrong or right. And this, my husband cannot hold many boundaries. He's ... Doesn't like conflict, doesn't like to hurt other people's feelings, doesn't like to not include everybody, and I'm like, Betty boundary.
So we're constantly having this conflict. He's forever dinner party, let's have every single person we [00:16:00] know. " I'm like we can only see 10 at the table, so let's pick our 10." So know your boundary relationship, yourself with your own relationship with boundaries, and don't feel bad if you don't have them or can't have them, or they make you feel so miserable that it's not worth having them.
Consequently, also, don't feel bad if you can have them, and you live a life with lots of boundaries, that's also not bad. That doesn't make you narcissistic or selfish or narrow. It just means I have a shoot of inner peace that needs to be protected far more than someone who doesn't, where they have a wider space of internal peace that doesn't require as many boundaries.
Thank you for those notes though. Those were good. Chloe, I finally have the confidence to know that my daughter knows what she needs to do. I used to feel that if I didn't guide her, she wouldn't gotta tend to myself. Yep. And this disease, a- as in many things we have to take care of ourselves ultimately.
We have to keep our own battery [00:17:00] charged. We have to make sure, we're fed, ~we're s- ~we're sleeping, we're taking care of ourselves so that if we have the opportunity to help them, we have the resources to do and if we don't have the opportunity to help them, then we are at least living in this level of
I don't even know if happiness is the right word, but peace, contentment some satisfaction in our life quality, but if we don't take care of ourselves, then we're not gonna have that. And so I think that's really important to do, regardless of what your goal is, regardless of where you are in this, is it's very important to take care of ourselves.
Just our basic health needs, our basic mental health needs must be prioritized.
I try to tend to myself, but the gaslighting is so strong, I'm struggling to deal with it at the time, it's happening, any tips. The fact that you recognize that it's gaslighting is really important because gaslighting is gaslighting. ~And I never even knew what the phrase was until about eight or nine years ago, and I was like, gaslighting.~
But [00:18:00] yeah, when you recognize gaslighting, if you can train yourself to recognize it quickly, then you get those couple basic, "I'm sorry, you feel like that. " You, I say all the time if I'm being gaslight, you might be right, and I just shut it down. ~If I'm, ... ~Or I'll say, that's a good point, and maybe that's something we need to talk about in the future, but right now, we're talking about this thing."
If you get gaslit "Hey, you did the blank." Yeah, but you also do that, or, "You do this, " i'm like, "Okay we can talk about it later. Let's talk about what you did, because I haven't heard you mention what I did, so either it didn't bother you or didn't bother you enough to bring up, this does bother me, which is why I'm bringing it up now.
Happy to address your issue in the future." And I just, that's how I do it. So get a couple things that work for you that are readily handible, like you may be right, is readily handable. I don't have to think about it. If I get into myself into a situation, I'm like, "Okay, then stop. This is going to go badly.
I'm not going to win. This person is just hell bent that they're going to win." Then I'm just like, "You might be right. Shuts [00:19:00] him off immediately." So think about that protecting my peace, how can I terminate this conversation as quickly and smoothly and peacefully as possible?
All right. If my spouse says he doesn't care that he's an alcoholic, does this mean he's not in denial? Good question. No, I don't think he means that necessarily because it could just be, I don't know, a deflective statement. No, I don't think he means he's not in denial. I just think he means he's not ready to do anything about it.
He's not in an active stage of change, obviously, but he may know he's an alcoholic, but just ... No I think no. I think I'm standing by my answer. I, he may very well know he's an alcoholic and that it's a problem, but he's gonna say he doesn't care to shut you up or to derail your argument or your plan, which is he's not gona say, "You're right, honey.
I have a terrible problem and I need to stop. Please provide me some resources to stop." He's just gonna say, "I don't care." But that doesn't [00:20:00] mean he doesn't know it. It doesn't help you though when he says, "I don't care that you're just stuck." ~And that's like to your external things.~
If someone says, "I don't care if I have a problem," then you don't have any power over them. Now, if they're in denial or lying, then you can just act like that might be true, but you still have to stop at that point and wait. What are things we can do when we have set our boundaries, but as soon as drinking begins or the knowing he'll be drinking and driving is gonna happen, my emotions take over and I lose my peace.
~I'd be real curious, Debbie, to know what the boundary on that is. ~Yesterday in the live call, we had someone say, "Can I set a boundary that my husband can't drive drunk?" And I'm like, "No, that's a rule. The boundary is if I find out that you drive drunk, I will not stay married. The boundary is if I find out that you're driving drunk, I will talk to a lawyer and see what I can do to protect myself legally and financially."
~That's a boundary. ~So if this person is, as soon as the drinking begins and the knowing that he's drinking and driving, sounds like you don't have a boundary on that. It sounds like you have a rule. I could be misreading [00:21:00] that, but if you lose your peace, then you don't have a boundary because if you, if he drinks and drives and you have a boundary, then you'll be like, "Okay, time for action.
Time to put my boundary, try to hold my boundary would give me peace versus, oh, what do I do means I think he's broken a rule, but I'd be curious if I'm wrong. Married a long time. I thought I had this down. He spiraled and I went down the rabbit hole too. You're not alone. I am bouncing back faster and I recognize it.
~Any tips of stopping myself?" ~I'm super proud that you recognized it and you bounced back, so progress. I think you have to almost pre-plan a spiral or a relapse so that if this were to happen, this is what I'm going to do and it could be I'm going to do nothing. It could be I'm going to move out until he stops drinking. It could be I'm going to move into a separate bedroom. It could be I'm going to remove myself [00:22:00] from the room when he drinks.
Be prepared so that you don't go down the rabbit hole. I think where we go down the rabbit hole, ~and believe me, I've done it myself, God knows how many times, ~is if we think it's like, "Ooh, that's over. Oh, he's got it. " Thank God we got a handle on this. Then when you don't, then you're going to go down the rabbit hole because your whole belief system was just shattered.
So I think when we're living with addiction is don't have that belief system. Be hopeful, but don't be naive. Have a plan for if this were to happen. It's like when I get on an airplane, I'm sure thunder hope it doesn't go down, but I do tap the back of the seats and count how many there are until I get to my seat so that if there were fire and there, the lights go out, I know how many seats I need to touch between where I am and the exit.
I'm I'm not believing the plane is going down, but I'm not gonna be so naive to believe that I may not have to crawl out of here at some point, so I'm gonna be prepared. Same thing. Be prepared for the inevitable or the potential inevitable.
~All right. We have time for this. All right. ~My boundary [00:23:00] is ... Okay, so this goes back to the earlier question. Is my boundaries don't interact when he's been drinking. I'm trying to stop telling him what I think or judging. I just stay in a different part of the house. Yeah. Perfect. So hold that boundary. Just say, "Excuse me, it seems like we're having difficulty communicating.
I'm gonna just take a break." Whatever you need to say to put that boundary in place. So again, just like I just said to the other person, get a couple phrases that will give you a quick exit strategy, permission to leave, whatever you need to do, just get a couple things that you're gonna say so when he cracks that first beer, ~you don't have to go, oh my God."~
You just say, "Looks like I'm gonna be watching the movie in the other room tonight." Or, "Oh my gosh, I just remembered I told Jane I would call her. I'll see you in a little bit." Whatever it is to keep your own peace and not get dragged into a scuffle or a verbal fight over this, ~don't say if you're gonna drink, I'm going to another room."~
Just do it or make an [00:24:00] information update. Since you have decided to drink, I am going in the other room, as we earlier agreed. So again, it's how you set it up for your own peace and your own so you don't go down the rabbit hole. So just ... All right. We have one more. We have two more minutes.
~Nope. Okay. ~All right. I hope this was a really helpful video. It may require multiple watchings so that you can really look at I think she might be talking about me, or there might be aspects of me that I need to look at that are probably getting in the way. Very few of us get this flawlessly, are perfect at this so let's just look at, is it external or internal and is it changeable or not?
And then now what do I do based upon all that? Hopefully this topic was helpful and we will see you guys next Thursday. Lunch.
